NGOs get the boot

Had an interesting day today.

Most of my friends juped town for a wedding of mutual friends/colleagues in Saskatchewan.
It's funny how in England a 16hr drive is considered, well to tell the truth, is not considered - not ever.
Whereas here 16hrs is just a short hop.

Well, I stayed in Vancouver and played host to a nice japanese guy called Junichi whom I had never met before last night.
He's halfway through a d school with y company in kona.
About to go to mississippi to help with relief efforts.
We found a Japanese convienience store, ate sushi and talked alot of politics.
And I also inflicted "Tim Hortons" upon him to make sure he fully experienced canadian culture before moving on tomorrow.

The government in "Special K" is finally kicking out UN, and almost all western NGO presense in the country.
From an Ms perspective this seems like a very bad situation.
Local Asian governments have just upped their aid packages to Special K (due to the agreements on nukes); difference between UN/western NGO and Asian economic assistance comes down to the monitoring.
UN monitors with field presense where the aid goes to.
S Korea Japan and China do not.
This has provided the incentive to boot all monitors out now that unmonitored aid has been upped.

Who knows what will happen next.